Dismissing the beautiful sword, Sunny breathed a sigh of relief. The insidious whispers assaulting his mind disappeared, leaving only a lingering sense of chill and unease behind.
The pressure of the Call was already enough to drive a person insane. Adding the curse of the Sin of Solace to this burden was not for the weak of heart.
'Well, whatever. I'll just let Saint use it for now.'
He was impressed by the cursed blade, though. Its fundamental properties were already fearsome enough, considering that this Transcendent weapon's sharpness and durability were further enhanced by the [Perfect Jade] enchantment. It also synergizes well with Nightmare's [Dreadlord] Attribute and the [Mantle of Fear] Ability.
What made it so alluring to Sunny was the mental damage it dealt, though. Mind attacks… were an insidious thing. While not as obviously destructive as more straightforward elemental damage types and not as universally deadly and hard to defend against as soul attacks, they possessed one frightening quality.
The more sentience a being possessed, the more that being stood to be damaged by a mind attack.
What it meant was that while lesser Nightmare Creatures — Beasts and Monsters — would not be as susceptible to the [Sinister Whisper], the truly dangerous foes — Demons, Devils, Tyrants, Terrors… and humans — would suffer terribly from it.
And since those were the enemies Sunny was wary of the most, the Sin of Solace was a perfect tool to satisfy his needs.
'I just have to be careful not to suffer terribly myself.'
But even if he did… at least he would be reaping the benefits of the [Hideous Truth]. Sunny felt that the cursed sword would become truly terrifying if its wielder managed to unlock that strange enchantment. At its full force… maybe the Sin of Solace would be powerful enough to strike down even Great Nightmare Creatures.
Or Supreme humans...
With a wistful sigh, Sunny decided to check his progress in other areas, since he already had the runes summoned.
Shadow Fragments: [870/4000].
Not bad… after being stuck at [744/4000] for half a year, he had gained more than a hundred fragments in just two days. If this continued, Sunny would become a Tyrant in a not so distant future.
Of course, if he continued to fight at that intensity every day, he would also probably be dead by then.
Somewhat reassured, he shifted his gaze to the Mantle of the Underworld.
Vanquished Foes: [4555/6000].
The monumental task of satisfying the requirement of the [Prince of the Underworld] enchantment was nearing its final stage. With how many Nightmare Creatures ran rampant in Antarctica, Sunny would certainly be able to complete it soon. Now that his identity as Mongrel was, most likely, known to the members of his cohort, there should be no problem wearing the Mantle more often.
He still did not know how the onyx armor would grow after the limit was reached, but hoped to see something incredible.
Then, Sunny concentrated on his Shadows, starting with Saint.
Shadow Fragments: [101/200].
Saint was already halfway to becoming a… Saint. Or a Transcendent Demon, to be more precise. He could not even imagine how powerful she would be once he collected enough Memories — or Echoes — to feed to his loyal knight.
Still, a hundred or so Ascended Memories was not a small amount. Luckily, he could also use Memories of lesser Ranks, although the process would be much slower in that case.
Finally, he read the runes describing Nightmare.
Shadow Fragments: [14/300].
He sighed. To be honest, Sunny had not been very diligent about feeding his steed. For some reason, the black courser required much more fragments to Ascend than Saint had needed… maybe because he was already a Terror, or maybe because Saint had come from a race created by Nether, the Prince of the Underworld.
In any case, Sunny felt that helping her become Transcendent was more important than elevating Nightmare to an Ascended Terror. Especially considering that his Terror Ability, [Dream Curse], was still locked.
And speaking about that Ability… at least there had been more progress on that front.
Nightmares required: [112/1000].
His steed had already subjugated more than a hundred nightmares, both making himself stronger and growing closer to unlocking the [Dream Curse]. Of course, that task was still far from being over… but Sunny had a feeling that there would be a lot of progress soon.
Antarctica was in the throes of a cataclysm that had become known as the Chain of Nightmares, after all. It was bound to breed a lot of them. Better yet, up until now, the black steed had been limited to only subjugating nightmares of Masters — simply because Awakened humans did not dream.
Awakened Nightmare Creatures did, however. Which meant that Nightmare would be able to plant seeds of fear into their souls, and then visit the dreams of those abominations that had survived the encounter to harvest them.
'Maybe I should let him loose more often.'
And that was that, more or less. His own shadow fragments, that of Saint and Nightmare, the [Prince of the Underworld] enchantment, and the [Dream Curse]. These were the things he needed to concentrate on.
Then, there were other things — his arsenal of Memories, the power of his cohort, and the equipment of its members.
Oh, and he also had to survive, somehow.
'I probably will.'
Sunny had made a lot of progress, but there was a lot more progress still to be made.
Luckily, Antarctica was just the place to make it. It had an inexhaustible reserve of Nightmare Creatures of all kinds, with numerous new ones soon to arrive. As long as one could stay alive, there were countless opportunities for growth.
Master Jet had been right. This campaign was going to shift the balance of power across all of humanity… many new champions would emerge, many renowned warriors would become even stronger. Many would die.
Thinking about that, Sunny suddenly felt somber. Now, he was even more convinced that the great clans would not be able to stay away from the Chain of Nightmares for long.
He just had to make the best of it before they arrived, then.